


Addicted To Love

by mydogwatson



Series: WHILE THE MUSIC LASTS [12]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Established Relationship, John is resigned, M/M, On line research and Sherlock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-25
Updated: 2013-09-25
Packaged: 2017-12-27 15:10:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/980385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mydogwatson/pseuds/mydogwatson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock does research.  And then he outs them to Scotland Yard.  Normal day, then.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Addicted To Love

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to all for your comments and kudos. Hope you continue to enjoy the stories.

You like to think that you’re immune  
to the stuff…oh, yeah, it’s closer to   
the truth to say you just can’t get  
enough…you know you’re gonna  
have to face it:  
You’re addicted to love.  
-Florence and the Machine

 

“The statistics are unsettling, John,” Sherlock said, speaking for the first time in at least two hours.

John was relaxing with a book [actually rereading an old favorite, THE HITCHIKER’S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY] and an especially nice cuppa, so he really wasn’t in the mood to be unsettled. God only knew what Sherlock had been up to, bent over his computer and occasionally muttering irritably. Possibly he’d uncovered the rate of gruesome death for average [almost] sized doctors living with tall madmen. “What statistics are those then, Sherlock?” John finally asked, giving into the inevitable. As he did.

“The sex statistics.”

Well, now John was inclined to close the book. Immediately. And drop it to the floor. “Okay,” he said slowly. “Exactly what…sex statistics have unsettled you?” John was more that 75% sure that he didn’t want to know, but when dealing with Sherlock ignorance could be dangerous. He did not want to remember the night he’d just nodded absently about forty minutes into a Holmesian tirade and soon after found himself being dangled by his ankles over a…no, he really didn’t want to think about that.

Instead of responding immediately, Sherlock left the desk and joined him on the sofa. “We’re a couple now, right? Even if no one else knows it yet?”

“Yesss,” John replied cautiously.

It was all too easy to understand why Sherlock felt the need to ask that question, of course, even after the past month. John had lost count of how many times he’d announced to the world at large that, “We’re not a couple.” In retrospect, it made his chest ache to know how much each and every time he’d said those words had hurt Sherlock, who’d kept his own feelings so very hidden.  
Now he reached out and pushed an errant curl from Sherlock’s face. “Yes,” he said softly. “We’re most absolutely, positively a couple now.” That still didn’t feel like quite enough, so he leaned closer and whispered into Sherlock’s ear. “We always were, only one of us was too stupid to know it.”

“You,” Sherlock said firmly.

“Yes, thanks for that.” John leaned back. “So? Those statistics?”

“Oh, yes.” Sherlock’s brows drew together. “After one year together, the average British couple has sex 1.3 times a week. Although I am not quite sure how that .3 works.” His frown was eloquent. “I much prefer our schedule.”

“Three times a day?” John said with a smile. Admittedly, not every episode involved in that daily quota was as leisurely as might be wished or necessarily in their bed. Or even in their flat. But sometimes, during a case, needs must. It was only lucky that Sherlock knew where all the cameras in London were located.

Sherlock smirked. “Occasionally five times,” he pointed out.

Well, last Thursday was a day that John would not soon forget. Or ever, frankly. There were even pictures. Not of the actual….but Sherlock had used his phone to snap a few shots of an absolutely ravished John Watson puddled in the middle of the bed.

Sherlock shifted so that he was sprawled out on the sofa with his head in John’s lap. Something else the world did not know was that Sherlock Holmes was fond of cuddling. “Honestly, John,” he said once they were settled, “one point three times a week does not sound very appealing to me.”

“Oh, I very much agree,” John said, running his fingers through soft curls. “However, you’re forgetting one very important thing.”

Sherlock frowned again. His research was always impeccable. “What have I forgotten?”

John bent and kissed him lightly. “There is absolutely nothing about us that is average.”

Sherlock beamed at him.

 

 

John had just assumed [and, yes, he was aware of the dangers of that when dealing with an unpredictable genius] that there would be no change at all in the way Sherlock behaved at crime scenes.

And there hadn’t been, really. He was still brusque, imperious, taking far too much delight in the most gruesome of sights. He still ordered John around in a way that caused Donovan and Anderson to look at him either sympathetically or with matching smirks, depending John had always imagined, on whether or not Mrs. Anderson was in town.

So it seemed likely that everyone else still saw John as a hapless follower and Sherlock as an asexual computer. Neither of them minded what others thought, although they both also were aware that one day their relationship would undoubtedly become public knowledge. John just wanted it to happen in a simple, non-dramatic way.

Well, he could hope.

Given all of that, he was unprepared when Sherlock waved him over closer to the body. “An unhappy marriage,” the detective pronounced definitively. “Do you agree, John?”

He did a quick survey of the bloody corpse. “Well, if the wife is the one who plunged the carving knife directly into his heart and then attempted to remove his, uh---“ He gestured. “---then, yes, I’d say a very unhappy marriage indeed.”

Sherlock smiled at him.

Lestrade and the others were still listening.

“So,” Sherlock said, standing and smoothing the front of his suit jacket. “I suggest that you find the missing wife. Possibly her paramour.”

Lestrade nodded. “Anything else?”

“Well, they should have known that only having sex 1.3 times a week is not enough to maintain a happy marriage.”

“All right,” Lestrade said, looking a little bewildered. “We’ll find her.”

John saw Donovan and Anderson smirking and could only imagine what they were saying to one another as regarding Sherlock and sex. Nothing flattering, he was sure.  
But as it turned out, judging by the expression on his face, Sherlock was not quite finished yet. Oh, he definitely had more to say.

It was then that John began to feel just a slight twinge of concern. He started to make leaving sounds and shuffling his feet in the direction of the main road.

“Perhaps I should publish a monograph on the subject,” Sherlock was now saying thoughtfully.

John decided to try telepathy. Don’t ask, he sent in Lestrade’s direction, please just don’t ask.

John was glad he’d never believed in telepathy, as he would now feel very let down.

“A monograph on what?” the inspector asked.

“Sex, of course,” Sherlock snapped. “Please keep up. John and I, for example, have found that three times a day is optimal for our relationship.”

There were various kinds of silence in the world and John Watson had experienced many of them. A body in the moment after life ceased. The Afghan desert at midnight. But he had never, ever, heard a silence as absolutely silent as the one happening in that moment

Only one creature seemed not to notice anything out of the ordinary. That completely ridiculous man just surveyed the scene and smiled brightly, looking very much like a misfit little boy who expected, this time, to be praised for his cleverness rather than being mocked as usual. 

At which point, John’s insides melted.

Well, everyone was going to find out sooner or later anyway and at least this took care of it efficiently, albeit with more detail than absolutely necessary, so what the hell.

So when Sherlock opened his mouth again [although what there could possibly be left to say, John really didn’t want to contemplate], the ex-soldier just stood at parade rest and waited, along with everyone else.

“Of course,” Sherlock said, still thoughtful, “sometimes on a special day, five times is rather nice.”

Someone nearby squeaked and John rather thought it was Anderson, which pleased him more than it probably should have. Lestrade cleared his throat; it was easy to see why he was the boss if he could actually ask a question now. “And, uh, what exactly constitutes a ‘special day’?”

John really had to admire the inspector’s fortitude.

Sherlock raised a brow in Lestrade’s direction. “Well, perhaps I am not yet an expert on the subject, but it seems to me that having sex five times makes a day very special indeed.” Then he smiled again. “Of course, solving a case in less than an hour helps to set the mood,” he added cheerfully. Then he whipped around, coat swirling, and headed for the road. “Come along, John, time to go home.”

John managed to give one [hopefully not terribly smug] look at the flummoxed faces surrounding him, before shrugging and ambling after Sherlock.

fini


End file.
